Texts in Context: The Roman Empire After Rome
The reign of Justinian and Theodora seemed like it might be the recovery of a Roman Mediterranean; at first.
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Medieval
Texts in Context: From Antiquity to the Mediævum
We have come now to, perhaps, the most libeled and distorted period in all of human history. Let’s clear a few things up before we properly begin!
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Dante: An Author Profile, Continued
DanteAn Author ProfileSecond Canto: Vita Nuova By Gabriel Blanchard From the depths of political, personal, and spiritual defeat, Dante went on—”God knoweth how”—to write one of the great
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Dante: An Author Profile
The canon of literature is like a lofty tower, composed by hands that seem superhuman (for “there were giants in the earth in those days”). Yet one poet surpassed storied Babel; for he did “reach unto heaven, and make a name.”
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Boccaccio: An Author Profile
The Renaissance was a pivotal historical period which did not exist, and lasted for one century that began in 1300 and ended in 1650, give or take fifty years in both directions. These, at least, are the impression one might take away from reading a randomly-chosen handful of modern historians.
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St. Bernard: An Author Profile
St. BernardAn Author Profile By Gabriel Blanchard The academy, the battlefield, the royal court, and the chapel of twelfth-century Europe all bore the mark of St. Bernard’s hand.
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De Pizan: An Author Profile
Victorian novelist Frank Smedley wrote that “All’s fair in love and war”; though we cannot be sure, Renaissance diplomat Christine de Pizan might have thrown her complete works at his head if she had heard that.
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D’Argenteuil: An Author Profile
D’ArgenteuilAn Author Profile By Gabriel Blanchard We do not typically think of wife and nun as words that can apply to the same woman at the same time.
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Lessons From Purgatory
Lessons From Purgatory By Autumn Kennedy In its own capacity, Dante’s Purgatorio resembles Virgil, shepherding its readers up the sacred mountain in this life as he shepherded its
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Malory: An Author Profile
MaloryAn Author Profile By Gabriel Blanchard No one codified the legend of King Arthur and its meaning for English culture as powerfully as Thomas Malory. ❧ Full name
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